Taiwan's first 500 purchased Stinger missiles to start arriving this month after years of delay
Military officials say the first 500 Stinger air defence missiles and 178 launchers that Taiwan paid for will reach its army and navy between October and year-end.
TAIPEI —
The first 500 FIM-92 Stinger shoulder-fired air defence missiles that Taiwan bought from the United States, together with 178 launchers, will be shipped to Taiwan between this month and the end of the year, military officials told the Liberty Times on Friday. The officials said the deliveries would strengthen the short-range air defence of Taiwan's ground forces.
The batch is the first phase of a two-phase purchase that totals 2,621 missiles and 763 launchers. The officials drew a clear line between these missiles and the Stingers that troops have already carried in recent Han Kuang exercises and live-fired in July. Those, they said, were stock items the US gave Taiwan free of charge under presidential drawdown authority, while the missiles arriving by year-end are ones Taiwan has paid for itself.
Who gets the missiles
According to the officials, the army will take the largest share of the full order, 2,235 missiles and 657 launchers, to be deployed for defence duties across northern, central, southern and eastern Taiwan and on the outlying Kinmen, Matsu and Penghu islands. The navy is allotted 295 missiles and 85 launchers, which will go to the Marine Corps and to some ships whose own air defences are weak. The military police will receive 91 missiles and 21 launchers for field air defence of the Taipei garrison area.
The military police 202nd Command has already formed an air defence company under its 228th Battalion to operate the weapon, and military police crews fired Stingers at the Jiupeng range during an exercise in July, the Liberty Times reported. In August, marines showed a four-boat formation of M109 special operations assault craft carrying both Stinger and Javelin teams during Han Kuang drills.
The officials described the system as weighing about 15.7 kilograms in total, with an effective range of about 4.8 kilometres, a maximum range of close to 8 kilometres under some conditions, and a ceiling of roughly 3,800 to 4,000 metres. Its combined infrared and ultraviolet seeker is designed to resist flares.
A long wait
The order has been a recurring point of friction in the legislature. In May, Defence Minister Wellington Koo confirmed the first 500 missiles would arrive by the end of 2026 and said the second batch of 2,121 had not yet received a US letter of offer and acceptance. The ministry told lawmakers at the time that deliveries of the first batch, a purchase signed in 2017, would begin in the fourth quarter, a wait of about nine years. Under the plan reported then, the army's second-batch missiles are due in 2031.
Sources
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